Use Audio to Grow as a Writer

Each of us have the same constraints for our writing life: time. Yet some people manage to get so much more done in that 24 hour period. We want to write (and have plans in this area) yet we also want to continue to grow as writers and communicators.

One of the tools that I've been using for this area of growth has been audio. While I don't have a long commute like many people, I do spend a fair amount of time in my car driving—even in short bursts of time like five or ten minutes. How do I use those short amounts of time?

Several years ago, I purchased Jack Canfield's bestselling book, The Success Principles, How to Get from Where You Are to Where You Want to Be. I hauled the book to a conference where I saw Jack and he autographed my book. I hauled the book on several trips—yet never managed to crack open the pages and read it. If you are a reader, I imagine you have a few books where you handle them in the same way.

I decided I wanted to learn the information in The Success Principles and another means to that information was through audio. I purchased the audio book and loaded the six CDs into my car player. Then for the next few weeks every time I was in my car—even for a few minutes—I turned on the audio book. In a short amount of time, I heard every single CD and learned a great deal from these CDs. In fact, the experience was so valuable to me that I plan to hear the entire book again soon.

Several weeks ago, I launched Jumpstart Your Publishing Dreams Audio. It is almost an hour and a half of my teaching about different ways you can jumpstart your publishing life. It doesn't matter whether you are unpublished or much published, you will gain practical insight and inspiration from this CD.

Karen Morerod, author of More Than Just A Pretty Face, wrote about my CD, “The most challenging thing for me is: time. My family is great at giving me writing time, but after working seven hours away from home, my energy/creative levels are waning by the time I get home - IF, indeed, I have the luxury of being at home in the evening.

Many times I’ve driven the two hours from KC to Mahattan and I must say, listening to your CD was the fastest drive I've ever had! Usually when I try to listen to CDs in the car, my mind wanders. But this CD totally got me encouraged to get BUSY - plus it had such practical ideas. The CD gave me vision! It was wonderful.”

Time is the challenge for every writer. If you choose wisely, you can use audio as another tool in your arsenal to grow as a writer. It's what I'm doing. Are you?